Rise of the Dragon
Rise of the Dragon was Dynamix' first foray into Point and Click Adventure Gaming after being bought out by Sierra in 1990. Unlike other games in the Sierra line, Rise of the Dragon featured a first-person perspective and two side-scrolling Platformer sections in addition to the then-standard style of gameplay for an Adventure Game.
Rise of the Dragon is set in a Blade Runner-inspired Crapsack World. In the year 2053, in Los Angeles, California ex-cop William "Blade" Hunter is hired by the mayor to find out who is responsible for the horrific demise of his daughter, Chandra, whose use of transdermal patches led her to be the first victim of a mutagenic poison.
The plot and characters are a blend of Noir tropes, After the End, and supposedly Chinese mythology, leading Blade to an Ancient Conspiracy to revive an ancient Chinese sorcerer (the titular "Dragon").
Rise of the Dragon was touted the following year, receiving a Special Award for Artistic Achievement from Computer Gaming World, and a 5 out of 5 star review from Dragon magazine.
After the inital DOS release, a second CD-based version was made, followed by a Sega CD port of that rerelease, which removed some of the more adult material, including the ammunition for Blade's sidearm (but not the weapon itself).
- After the End: Implied by an ad in the included comic-book for a World War III army set and casual mention of high background radiation in the air.
- AKA-47: Blade's Particle Beam Pistol is manufactured by With & Smesson.
- Always Check Under the Pillow
- Ancient Conspiracy: As revealed in the opening animation, the whole plot is run by one.
- Badass Longcoat: Blade owns (and wears) one of these.
- BFG: Towards the end of the game, you can get one of these by requesitioning it from the Police armory.
- Big Bad: The opening animation shows Bahamut and Jonny Quong discussing their plan.
- Body Horror: Using the "drug" results in lethal Transformation Trauma. A forced overdose melts one character's flesh from his bones. Blade gets to watch it happen.
- Bowdlerize: Among the alterations made when porting the game to the Sega CD:
- Removal of a french kiss because of implied sex despite the game getting an MA-17 rating from Sega of America.
- Removal of one of two dancers in the Pleasure Dome.
- The other dancer was made into a silhouette, making her seem to be naked despite both dancers originally being in stage outfits. Stripperiffic stage outfits, but outfits nonetheless.
- Removal of the power pack for Blade's particle beam pistol.
- The Chosen One: An ancient prophecy predicts a chosen warrior to rise against the ancient evil. At one point, a character asks Blade if he is The Chosen One. He is.
- Crapsack World: The future is heavily polluted, has high background radiation, and is loaded with criminals. The police are everywhere, but don't seem to do anything about it.
- Deadpan Snarker: Blade.
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Blade: Wow, nice art. Looks like a friggin' spleen. |
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- The Dragon: Jonny Quong, the titular character's right-hand man.
- Earn Your Happy Ending: Blade goes through a lot to close this case (and get back with his girlfriend in the process).
- The Future Is Noir: Blade is very much a futuristic version of Sam Spade.
- Guide Dang It: Towards the end of the game, a puzzle requires you to rewire a collar set to flood a character's bloodstream with the mutagen. In order to do so, you must first back away from the close-up view. As the terminals, the wires connect to on one end are clearly visible in the close-up view, this is less than intuitive.
- Impressive Pyrotechnics: At any point in the game, you can blow up the villains' chemical plant. The explosion is quite impressive despite the plant actually producing a custom retrovirus (meaning fewer volatile chemicals on hand than implied by calling it a chemical plant).
- It May Help You on Your Quest: Chang Li gives you a few seemingly random items. Two are joke items. One is body armor. One appears to be a Joke Item, but gets you past a puzzle with minimal effort.
- It Sucks to Be the Chosen One:
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Blade: What happens to this "chosen one"? |
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- Joke Item: Along with body armor, Chang Li gives you a few of these.
- Made of Explodium: Blowing up the electric company's meter on the villains' chemical plant blows the whole building sky high.
- Mercy Mode: Die five times in the arcade sequences, and the PC version of the game offers to let you skip them.
- MST: One of the Sega CD port, courtesy of Slowbeef and Diabetus of Retsupurae fame.
- Nice Hat: Johnny Quong's pimp hat. The only time he takes it off right before his execution.
- One-Winged Angel: Just prior to the final arcade sequence, Bahamut reveals the true purpose of the designer "drug".
- Save Scumming: There are quite a lot of ways to either end the game or render it Unwinnable.
- Screw Destiny: Both the hero and the villain have reason to follow the prophecy up to a point. Which point that is differs between the two of them.
- Shout-Out: Aside from the city bearing a strong resemblance to Blade Runner, the video sequence showing the effect that MZT has on human blood cells is an obvious reference to The Thing.
- An eyepatch-wearing, mullet-sporting, tattooed criminal named Snake? Sounds vaguely familiar...
- Slasher Smile: Jonny Quong sports one so often, it's a wonder he isn't in jail on suspicion of being a serial killer.
- Sniper Pistol: Failing to pick up the BFG doesn't hinder your performance in the sniper battle at all.
- Talk to the Fist: In the ending, Blade gets to do this to the Mayor.
- Transformation Trauma: See Body Horror above.
- Unwinnable: There are a number of ways to render the game unwinnable. In precisely one case, Blade has the courtesy of notifying the player of this.
- What Happened To The Jake?
- Yellow Peril: The Big Bad in charge of the Ancient Conspiracy, along with a few of his lieutenants, are middle-aged Chinese men with Fu Manchu mustaches.
- You Have Failed Me...: Deng Hwang to Johnny Quong, for failing to stop Blade.